IN THE TIME OF THE BELLS

Of Maria Gripe's two distinct modes of writing we confess that the remote fairy tale style is not our favorite. This example, which weaves a tight, well-designed fabric of traditional elements--a prince/pauper switch, a lurking, evil dwarf, a symbolic tapestry--begins with the inner tortures of a sleepless, sixteen-year-old king who rejects his role and glimpses ""intimations of another reality""; it ends as a romance when the whipping boy brought in for him from the country turns out to be the king's older, illegitimate half-brother and a far fitter figure on the throne. Thus King Arvid can abdicate and satisfy his spiritual wanderlust with an easier head, and Elisif, his parentally appointed bride-to-be who wants to be Queen but has fallen in love with the whipping boy (and he with her), can have it both ways. Elegantly executed for those who prefer their angst at arm's length--but even so, without the facets of The Glassblower's Children (1973).